


Put Up A Fight to Find You

by richiebeepbeep



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: 27 Years In-Between, Angst with a Happy Ending, Comedian Richie Tozier, Driver Eddie Kaspbrak, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, Recreational Drug Use
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-21
Updated: 2019-12-21
Packaged: 2021-02-24 15:40:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21880345
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/richiebeepbeep/pseuds/richiebeepbeep
Summary: Richie's longtime manager, a little guy with dark hair and a permanent stress line between his brows named Steve, had told him not to stay out too late. His bed — which was waiting for him at the most relatively decent hotel room a growing career in comedy could pay for — would be cold and empty like always. The only person who ever flopped down alongside him was Steve, but they weren't anything more than friends because dating your manager was asking for trouble.Or, Richie Tozier has spent ten years trying to replace someone he can't even remember and Eddie Kaspbrak won't let this fucked-up stranger walk home alone after a party.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 18
Kudos: 334





	Put Up A Fight to Find You

**Author's Note:**

> This is my IT Secret Santa gift for njess04 on Tumblr. Happy holidays, I hope you like it!

It was so cold that Richie couldn’t feel his face, numb from the tip of his nose to his tingling lips. All that coke he’d done on some mid-tier celebrity’s pricey living room coffee table might have had something to do with that, too. His longtime manager, a little guy with dark hair and a permanent stress line between his brows named Steve, had told him not to stay out too late. Well, it was nearing two in the morning which meant that Richie hadn’t even stayed at the party until the typical last call. If he was doing his math right, he could squeeze in a few hours of sleep before absolutely needing to get up at noon. Even more if he drank enough to pass out soon and skipped all the hours of tossing-and-turning he usually did.

His bed — which was waiting for him at the most relatively decent hotel room a growing career in comedy could pay for — would also be cold. It would be big and empty like always, because Richie almost never let anybody sleep with him. He had sex of course, but he didn’t ever let it happen at his place, hotel or not. The only person who ever flopped down alongside him, exhausted and weirdly all the more sexy for it, was Steve. Except he and Steve weren’t anything more but friends because dating your manager was asking for trouble. Besides, their star signs were incompatible or some such fucking nonsense. In all honesty, Richie was self-aware enough to realize that Steve knew how much of a wreck he would be in a relationship. It had nothing to do with horoscopes.

That didn’t stop them from dancing around the possibility of getting together, if not simply to stifle the freaky sexual tension between them. They coexisted like some kind of fucked up yin-yang situation, their energies balancing each other out like a shaking scale. Simply working alongside Steve was a perfect, painful sway. Sometimes Richie felt like they were sitting precariously on a hammock made for one, grasping desperately at each other so as not to fall over like a couple of absolute idiots. Inevitably they would flip the proverbial hammock and smash face-first into the wooden planks below, splinters scraped into their ruddy and tear-stained cheeks. It would hurt and they would split to lick their wounds and never speak of their time together on the hammock. That was exactly the kind of oddly familiar tension Richie was used to, the same kind he perpetually chased and craved in all of his short-term relationships. He had a type: dark hair, big eyes, short stature (and more often than not, a short fuse to boot).

Steve reminded Richie of the heat of summers he could still taste on his tongue, even in the biting New York City wintertime. It absolutely killed Richie inside to not understand why. He’d always had this ridiculous sense of _longing_ , of yearning for something that probably never existed in the first place. Richie missed a past he couldn’t even fucking define. Other people fondly recalled their childhood friends, memories of playing in the park or joining little league or holiday choir concerts; Richie didn’t remember any of these things. He knew the facts and could make educated guesses, of course. He’d grown up in Derry, Maine with his parents Went and Maggie Tozier, which was why he’d avoided the east coast until now, the winter of 2003. He must have had a bad run-in with a neighborhood dog in the dark at some point, which might’ve explained his intense fight-flight-freeze fear of werewolves.

Richie had always assumed that everyone’s childhoods were a foggy patchwork of smells and colors and aches, because if he didn’t this extreme lapse in memory might’ve been cause for concern.

He didn’t like to be concerned. Richie was an anxious person sometimes, but he preferred to go-with-the-flow and adapt, roll with the punches and take shit as it came. He still threw up when he got nervous and refused to take any medication (or attend therapy) for it, still told himself he’d cut back but drank excessively at every opportunity, still tried to be a responsible professional comedian but took stupid cocktails of drugs at parties like he _wanted_ to join the 27 Club. That was why Richie could feel the earth turning under him in a tangible shifting beneath his feet right now. It helped to be messed up, a little bit sloppy, because it quieted the _noisenoisenoise_ in his head and he, the Man of Many Voices, could stand to just be himself.

Just Richie.

Just Richie, with a secret he could only stomach spilling when his body was half-numb and talking was ten times harder. Just Richie, who was so utterly pathetic that he’d purposefully broken the hearts of every woman he’d ever dated because he couldn’t stand to face himself. Just Richie, who had never in his life held hands with another man because he was afraid of what people would think or say or _do_ when they saw it.

It really was a white Christmas out here, snow dusting the pavement in a thick enough layer that it crunched slightly under his step. The streetlights and the colorful string lights hanging over shop windows reflected rather beautifully against the ice. Richie couldn’t stop staring, lost in the vague nostalgia of holding onto someone for warmth in the winter. As he walked faster, the chilly wind burning his nose, Richie almost had the memory in his grip. It was the nineties for sure, something from the tail-end of his youth. He closed his eyes, like it might’ve helped. Cold hands under thick gloves, his pale fingers pressing into a colder, puffy jacket. It had been blue, more of a periwinkle than a navy, and there was a maroon — burgundy — carmine — scarf wrapped around the freckled neck of…

“Asshole!”

He’d bumped into someone rather nastily, because he’d been walking forward with his eyes closed. _Asshole_ , indeed. Richie sucked in a breath between his teeth, taking a step back to survey the damage he’d done. He dragged his eyes up from the snowy sidewalk to a pair of neat, black shoes and dress pants and a blue winter coat, more of a periwinkle than a navy. Richie must have been making some sort of face, because the other man raised his brows, which were dark and incredibly expressive.

“Sorry,” Richie slurred. He could barely feel his tongue.

“Jesus,” the man huffed a not-quite laugh, brows now knitted with concern. “Christmas came early for you, huh?”

Richie sucked in another breath, exhaling sharply. He could see his breath in the night air and his stomach churned almost painfully. He felt like he was about to pitch to a network, palms sweating in his pockets and bile rising in his throat. What the fuck was his problem?

“Are you… alright?” The man squinted in suspicion or recognition or _something_ , crossing his arms over his chest. His stance was so familiar, Richie finally registered that the man looked a lot like Steve. He figured that maybe he was just nervous about getting in trouble with Steve for walking unfamiliar streets in the middle of the night with far too many drugs in his system. This guy, some nobody some stranger, had just set off his panic instinct.

But that wasn’t entirely it, was it? There was a nagging pinch in the back of Richie’s mind, insisting that there was so much more to this random interaction. He could almost _hear_ a muffled, subconscious screaming that might as well have been shouted in another language for all Richie understood of it.

He took a chance on the feeling: “Have I seen you somewhere before?”

The man looked taken aback, as if he’d been caught thinking the same thing. How embarrassing for the two of them to know each other’s faces but not their names! Richie needed to figure out who this guy was like he needed to violently scratch an itch he couldn’t possibly reach. The man shrugged in his blue coat, shaking his head in a way that implied he didn’t fully believe the answer was a firm _no_.

“Not unless you’re a celebrity?” He didn’t sound too sure, but the way his lips thinned almost offended Richie. “I know that sounded like a dickish response but I’m not famous, I just drive rich people around. I feel like I know — like I’ve seen you before.”

Richie grinned, cheeks aching in the chill. “You have,” he said confidently.

“Where?” The man leaned in as if Richie were about to tell him some great secret.

“Your mother’s bedroom,” Richie said instead.

“Ugh!” The man scoffed and, as if he’d done it a thousand times before, shoved Richie’s shoulder playfully. “Cut it out, Trashmouth.”

A long silence followed, as Richie and the other man stared at each other, unmoving like their feet were glued to the pavement. The man’s hand was still hovering idly, awkwardly near Richie’s arm.

Finally, “You, uh,” Richie shook his head and the world spun brilliantly. He leaned back against the nearest light pole. “I haven’t been called that in years. Only my fuckin’ hometown friends…”

“Derry,” the man breathed. “You’re from Derry. Holy shit, Richie fuckin’ —!”

The floodgates were suddenly open. Richie’s eyes widened almost comically, though no longer magnified by coke bottle lenses: he’d graduated to contacts around five years ago and hadn’t yet looked back.

The man — Eddie, Eds, ten other ridiculous nicknames Richie gave him that he pretended not to like — surged forward and for a split second, Richie thought he was going to get clocked in the nose. Instead, he found two warm arms around him and he felt like he was reliving the memory he was struggling so hard to recall earlier.

(It was newly Winter 1993 after a spectacularly embarrassing time at the Tozier family New Years’ Eve party. Eddie comforted him like no one else could have, a face finally losing its baby fat buried in Richie’s shoulder like he was never planning on letting go. Richie had earlier voiced his firm decision to abandon the dentistry trade in favor of a career in radio hosting and it had been less than well-received by his parents. It wasn’t that the Toziers didn’t think their son was talented, of course, it was just that the entertainment industry was _hard_ and _a million other kids want the same job_ and Richie understood that they loved him so much but they thought he wasn’t talented _enough_.

But Eddie, who was always rooted in the terrifying reality of AIDS blood and flu shots and a perpetual smear of VapoRub under his perky nose, believed in him. That had been enough for Richie to believe in himself and because he loved — _loved!_ — Eddie Kaspbrak with every fiber of his being, he believed that his dear Eds could escape their hometown too. Ironically, their joint belief in their respective abilities to ‘make it’ outside of Derry together had eventually ripped them apart: Eddie stayed stuck in Derry to care for his mother, who had suddenly begun to ail right before he was supposed to go to college, and Richie up and left town as soon as he possibly could for the sunny west coast and never looked back, though not of his own volition.)

Richie leaned away from Eddie and knocked his own head against the light pole with a quiet _oof_ , reaching up to rub the back of his head. “Eds,” he barely got it out before —

“ _Don’t_ call me that,” Eddie was smiling.

“You got it, Eduardo.”

“Not what I meant, Rich.”

Richie laughed, the nerves from before dissipating as if they were never there in the first place. He and Eddie were still standing near each other, close enough that they might be mistaken for a pair of lovers from across the street.

“I didn’t know you lived in —”

“I don’t,” Richie cut him off. “I live in Los Angeles. I’m here on tour.”

“Tour? Jesus H.” Eddie wrinkled his nose, practically cherry red from the cold. “Did you become a musician or something? Are you actually fucking famous?”

Richie made a so-so motion with his hand and he could tell that Eddie didn’t know whether to assume he was being humble or not. “I’m a comedian, actually. Believe it or not, people pay good money to see me sweat on stage for an hour and crack wise.”

“Gross,” Eddie took a step away from Richie, as if he’d just noticed how close together they were standing. He crossed his arms again, but his big, brown eyes were wandering up-and-down Richie’s body. It made him a little self-conscious. “What the hell are you doing out here, dipshit? Wandering around in the middle of the fucking night in a city you don’t even live in? God, you’re dumb, Richie.”

“Hah,” Richie scrunched his brows together and smiled. “Yeah, remember when I graduated earlier than you and also any of our friends?”

Eddie pursed his lips. “Uh, no? Wait, yes. I hate that you're smart. Wow,” he paused and looked away. “Fuck, I feel like I’m remembering an entire lifetime right now. Where'd it all go?”

Richie’s expression sobered slightly, though he still felt lighter than air when he closed his eyes. He wondered if he should be embarrassed that he’s probably been one of the fucked up celebrities that Eddie’s had to pick up before. With a slick suit like that on, Eddie must’ve just gotten off work. Richie realized that since he’d opened his eyes, he’d been staring at Eddie fairly intensely.

“Sorry, I — I didn’t mean to forget you, Eds. Eddie, I would never — I’d never fucking do that, I don’t know what the fuck happened to me.” The words were spilling out too easily, his tongue loose from the joint he’d smoked before he left the party and his thoughts fast from the bump he’d done in the bathroom for the road. _Idiot_. _Stupid fucking idiot_.

Eddie uncrossed his arms to put his hands up, soothing Richie like he were a frightened farm animal. “Hey, Richie, it’s okay, man! I forgot too,” he swallowed thickly. “I didn’t mean to either. You were my… Richie, you were my best friend.”

Richie nodded slowly as Eddie patted him on the arm firmly.

(It was Spring 1994 and Richie had held out as long as he could after graduating early, saving money and convincing his parents that he had what it took to make his dreams a reality. He was stubbornly ambitious, surprisingly charming, and not too bad-looking, if he did say so himself. And he did say so himself. _Someone_ had to! Richie was sitting in the driver’s seat of the car he and his father split the price to purchase, all of his most important belongings in the trunk and backseat. He’d be driving to the west coast and as much as he’d begged, Eddie wouldn’t go with him. His mother couldn’t be without him, California was much too far, he didn’t have the spare cash for a road trip, it was too dangerous to drive at night, etcetera etcetera etcetera.

Eddie leaned in through the passenger side window and patted Richie on the arm. Richie shook off his grip to adjust his glasses, and from behind those big frames, pleaded Eddie to be as brave as he knew he could be. Eddie leaned out of the window and in the light of the setting sun, Richie could see the tears welling up in his eyes. He promised to call and he didn’t, but that wasn’t his fault. Eddie didn’t call either.)

“Rich, maybe it happened because you moved away or because we grew up, grew apart, whatever. It doesn’t matter, bro.”

“Bro?” Richie’s face twisted up like he’d tasted something sour, and then he laughed, leaning back into the light pole without smacking his head into the icy metal.

“Yeah? What the fuck’s funny about that, man? Lots of people say ‘bro.’” Eddie was pouting adorably, an expression that really shouldn’t work on a grown man’s face.

Richie nodded, bringing up a hand to stifle his laughter. He snorted into his hand and Eddie’s stare softened. He couldn’t allow himself to explain why he was laughing, why the casual write-off as a _bro_ hurt Richie in a way he couldn’t properly articulate at the moment anyway. Not that he’d want to talk about it — about _that_ — when he was sober.

“You should _not_ be walking alone right now, Richie. Come on,” Eddie made a waving gesture with one hand, pulling Richie away from the light pole with the other. His fingers felt firm on his arm and though he was only imagining it, they were comfortably warm. “Where are you staying?”

“Your mom’s,” Richie answered.

Eddie sighed through his nose. “Try again, shitlips.”

Richie wrapped an arm around Eddie’s shoulders, which were only slightly broader than he remembered. Eddie was still lean, built for running track and field even though he’d gone into _driving_ for some reason. He always did like cars, Richie guessed. “Yours?”

Eddie laughed stiffly, shrugging Richie’s arm off of him. Richie put his hands into his pockets.

“Not, like, actually. Obviously. Steve got us a room at the, uh —”

“Steve?”

Richie blinked. “Steve,” he confirmed.

Eddie pulled a face, then he looked away and started walking, despite Richie not giving him any sort of direction. Richie followed. “Who’s Steve?” Eddie sounded strangely measured, his tone even and perfectly conversational and entirely at odds with his body language. Quick steps, pinched brow, crossed arms. What the fuck did that mean?

Richie fingered idly at the cell phone in his pocket. His heart pounded uncomfortably. “My boyfriend,” Richie joked, only it didn’t sound like a joke and it made Eddie stop in his tracks so quickly that he couldn’t help but regret saying it.

Stupidly, Richie bumped into Eddie again.

“Oh, sorry.” Eddie whipped around and put a foot of space between them in a single step. Richie felt the bile rising again.

“No, that was my bad,” he said instead of admitting the Steve thing was a joke.

“It’s fine!” Eddie smiled and it looked like a grimace. “That’s okay! I mean, you know, not bumping into me but — I mean, that’s okay too!”

Richie truly wished he were dead. He wished the sidewalk would swallow him up, that he’d fall through a manhole and into the sewers to rot and wither away.

“I’m sorry,” Eddie looked concerned. “I’m not homophobic, Richie, don’t worry. I just didn’t think…”

“Right,” Richie said. “Course not. I fucked your mom so many times it’s probably hard to conceive.”

Eddie looked like he might explode. He must’ve not known whether to brush his own behavior off or to smack Richie for the mom joke. He did nothing, his hands hanging awkwardly in the air.

“Anyway,” Richie started walking again and moving fast because he wanted to get away he wanted to forget again he wanted to stay burrowed _deepdeepdeep_ in the closet but mostly he wanted the painful fucking memory of loving the shit out of Eddie Kaspbrak out of his head and heart because that feeling — that stupid goddamned _longing_ — was for him it was always always always for him. It was always Eddie. Richie sniffed. “Cool.”

“Richie, fuck,” Eddie chased after him, cursing at the cold. His legs were much shorter than Richie’s. “Man, seriously, I didn’t mean to make it weird.”

“Steve’s not my boyfriend,” Richie said.

“I’m so — wait, huh? Fucking what?” Eddie grabbed Richie by the arm again.

(It was Summer 1992. A shorter memory washed over him this time. Eddie, who had been gripping Richie’s arm excitedly and talking about the new entry in the Infinity Trilogy, let go of him suddenly when some dickhead Derry High dropout called them _a couple of queers_ from across the street. Richie remembered the burning shame of being caught and the white hot guilt of wanting Eddie to touch him like that again.

He did, of course, but the shame and guilt of constantly dragging Eddie down to his level never left Richie.)

“He’s not actually my boyfriend, he’s my manager. Totally wants to bone, though.” Richie felt like an idiot for saying it. Eddie let go of his arm and Richie yearned for a chilly death in the sewers once more.

Eddie seemed to be searching his face for something, but Richie just kept looking away. “Look at me, asshole.” He reached up and took Richie’s cheeks into his hands. “That isn’t funny. I thought I really hurt you, man.”

“Dude,” Richie looked into Eddie’s dark eyes until he couldn’t anymore. He shut his eyes and stayed standing there, letting Eddie hold onto his cheeks. It was freezing fucking cold and Richie could feel his ears burning anyway.

(It was Winter 1994. Richie’s parents were out, so he smoked a cigarette on their balcony while Eddie complained about lung cancer. They’d shared a bottle of wine, which had seemed very mature of them at the time.

Richie blew out a puff of smoke, fingers rubbing the pack of menthols on the balcony railing. “I just need to keep my mouth occupied when I’m not talkin’, Eds.” Eddie looked unimpressed.

“I can arrange that,” he said. Eddie took Richie’s face in his hands, warm fingers cupping his cold cheeks. Richie dropped his cigarette. Eddie kissed him on the mouth for the first time.

It wouldn’t be the last.)

“What is it, Richie?” Eddie sounded rather put-off to him. He was probably frustrated from dealing with a crossed idiot like Richie. The fact that he hadn’t taken off on his own already meant the world somehow.

Richie finally opened his eyes and he could feel Eddie thumb away his tears. When the fuck had he started crying?

“Rich?” It was softer than anything else he’d said tonight.

“I know, I know it’s not funny, but I’ve never been able to —” Richie looked toward the sky. He couldn’t really see the stars. He looked back down to Eddie, his caring gaze grounding him. “Steve is not my boyfriend. I don’t have a boyfriend. I’m kind of a huge fucking closet case, Eds, don’t tell TMZ.”

After a moment, Eddie smiled. “Trust me, Rich, I really don’t need the money. Your secret’s safe with me,” he said. He hadn’t let go of Richie’s face yet. “I don’t have a boyfriend either.”

“Girlfriend?”

Eddie shook his head.

“Hot mom?”

Eddie scoffed. “You just thrive on ruining the moment, don’t you, Trashmouth?”

Richie grinned. Tried to, at least.

“I don’t know why I like that about you,” Eddie’s cheeks were a splotchy pink that must’ve been from the weather. Richie couldn’t feel his fucking toes out here. They’d been standing in the snow like jackasses for twenty minutes.

“ _Well, good sir_ ,” Richie said in his better-developed British accent. “ _Sounds to me there’s a mystery afoot there! Let’s skip tea and solve it, shall we?_ ”

“God,” Eddie scrunched up his face. “Why the fuck are you good at that now?”

“ _Eddie, my love, practice makes perfect_.”

Again, Eddie surged forward further into Richie’s space. If he had a cigarette, Richie would’ve dropped it. As it was, he simply kissed Eddie back, wrapping an arm around his waist to pull him closer.

(It was Winter 2003 and Richie Tozier, with a numb face and fingers, had finally found what he’d been missing for nearly ten years of his life. With any luck, he’d never miss Eddie Kaspbrak again.)


End file.
